How can Leaders Build a Trusting Culture and Boost Productivity

"Can I trust you?"

How many times does this question go through your mind every day - consciously and unconsciously? This is a question that is part of almost every decision we make on a daily basis. Trust signifies the longevity of every relationship, be it personal, professional or organisational.

When the entire world transitioned to work from home, one of the puzzles organisations faced was "How will we monitor the activities of our employees?" Those organisations that built a culture around trust found it easier to manage the engagement and deliverables while others are still continuing to invest in technologies to enhance employee surveillance.

However, trust is a two-way street, you earn trust when you trust others. Some people might ask,

"Does trust matter that much at workplace?"

Trust is found to be a major factor determining the success of both employers and employees. But, do the surveillance tools ensure engagement and productivity too?

A leader plays various roles in running their teams and organisation, such as that of a strategist, influencer, motivator, negotiator etc. Leaders can use trust as a driving force to bring about changes in teams and organisation with minimal resistance. It also helps in improving the image of leaders among the employees as well as in the boardroom.

We will shortly discuss the tools you can use to develop and boost trust in yourself and in your team, before moving on to the advantages of a trust based workplace culture.

As a leader how can you boost your ability to trust others and get others to trust you?

A cultural change is the result of many behavioural changes. Not to mention that every behavioural change is accompanied by honing a set of skills. Let's take a look at the skills that drive and support a trust based culture. These skills will back your efforts to create a trust based culture, if you consciously incorporate practicing of these skills also in your strategy.

1. Communicate openly and effectively

When a person feels comfortable to disclose their aspirations, doubts, success, mistakes, failures and successes with you, they find that you are trustworthy. But they feel that comfort level only when you encourage them to speak up without judging, punishing or ridiculing that person for what they share with you or the way they share it with you.

Communication is one of the Secret Codes of the three Gates framework I have shared in my new book Unlock Your Hidden Potential: the key to unlock your success .

2. Actively Listen

Communication works only when there is a listener. Practice active listening, i.e., listen to understand the content, emotion and the objective of every conversation. Just like in the case of communication, people feel encouraged to share only when we listen non-judgmentally with our facial, verbal and body language response. Jumping into conclusion without active listening may backfire your intention. Active listening helps you to think from the other person's perspective and provide opinions, solutions and tips whenever and wherever appropriate.

I have shared more details about how to use empathetic and active listening in growing your influence among people and leading them effectively in my new book?Unlock Your Hidden Potential: the key to unlock your success .

3. Mentor Empathetically

When you nurture an environment that is rich in communication and listening, it is natural that many issues, fears, disagreements and conflicts come in the open, privately and publicly. Hence, equipping yourself and your team to mentor others in such situations is of crucial importance. When you mentor your team and provide platforms and opportunities to solve their problems, people feel the nurturing quality of the culture you are promoting.

Listening actively and thinking from the other person's perspective usually guides us to empathise with the other person's situation and emotion. Therefore, your response, suggestions and solutions should be reflective of that. People like to connect with, respect and trust others who are empathetic towards them. And these are some pre-requisites that help a person to decide whether they want to be mentored by someone.

I have shared more details about how to use mentorship, empathy in leading effectively in my new book Unlock Your Hidden Potential: the key to unlock your success .

4. Give and Take Timely Feedback

Feedback is a key attribute of every thriving team. In a trusting culture, people receive and give feedback to each other with sincerity, and hence they feel empowered to try out new things in such an environment. With the appreciation, guidance, encouragement and tips they receive, the team as a whole progresses faster with knowledge, experience and support. Such an environment is a cradle of innovation.

A feedback practice in a trust based culture should not be just top-down. It needs bottom-up and sideways feedback practices as well. Furthermore, encourage informal and timely feedback in order to make the feedback effective, as a formal setting comes with the risk of many constraints including that of delayed information sharing.

I have shared more details about the Secret Code of feedback and its role in our unlocking our potential to find new breakthroughs in my new book Unlock Your Hidden Potential: the key to unlock your success .

5. Be flexible

Even after formulating a trust based culture with all the above tools, many leaders find it difficult to create that culture. Flexibility is the word that you need to consider even when you are formulate. If you enforce stringent rules to enable a trust based culture, you are giving out the message that you are not willing to trust them. Be open to ideas and not be too rigid about following your only your path. Create guidelines, but encourage new ideas and appreciate others when they do things in new and efficient ways.

You can read more about discovering and unlocking your potential to find success and new breakthroughs, in my new book Unlock Your Hidden Potential: the key to unlock your success .

6. Self-reflection

Self-reflection is a one on one session with yourself where you connect the dots from what you have felt, thought, heard and observed with your actual objective. As the strategist and owner of the trust based culture, self-reflect on how effective your strategy is working and propagating to other levels. Also, as a practitioner, self-reflect on how effective your trusting and trustworthy behaviour are. Take the feedback you received also into account. No feedback and self-reflection is complete without analysing the issues surfaced, ideating ways to course correct and carrying out the corrective action wherever required.

I have shared more details about the Secret Code of feedback and its role in our unlocking our potential to find new breakthroughs in my new book Unlock Your Hidden Potential: the key to unlock your success .

Advantages of building a trusting culture in an organisation

1. Engaged employees

When managers promote trusting behaviour and policies in their teams, employees reciprocate this trust by taking ownership in delivering an effectively, irrespective of whether there is surveillance or not. However, in an organisation that gives more focus to surveillance than trust, employees find innovative solutions to appear 'engaged' in the surveillance tool while using their time to browse through social media and other online and offline distractions.

2. Less resistance and better acceptance of decisions and changes:

When trust is passed down from executives to managers and managers to teams, every person in the hierarchy takes up the ownership of their roles and responsibilities. They know that promises are delivered and hence that results in focused work, loyalty and better acceptance of changes.

3. Reduced office politics

A trusting environment fosters better peer-to-peer trust and hence people build better relationships between each other. This leads to a decrease in office politics and an increase in team cohesion.

4. Increased innovation spirit

People feel encouraged to try out new ideas. They feel confident and empowered to take accountability for their failures and mistakes, without worrying about hidden agendas.

5. Increased job satisfaction

All these lead to increased job satisfaction which enriches both the employer and the employee. A happy employee considers the interest of the organisation and the leader too and hence they tend to work and deliver productively.

6. Better mental wellbeing

A trusting culture in an organisation doesn't not foster many stress factors associated with a non-trusting environment. This results in better mental wellbeing of the employees.

At this juncture, it is easy to comprehend that trust is the thread that connects many workplace expectations of ours with the reality. If so, I wonder why do we still come across office politics, backstabbing, unhealthy competition and increased stress at workplace. Does your organisation and team consciously nurture and support a trusting culture? What are your experiences, challenges and observations regarding it? Please share your experience and views in the comment section below. Also, please share this article with your colleagues and leaders. With that you could initiate the dialogue about trust in your organisation and be a flag bearer of transformation.

This article is based on several Secret Codes from my new book Unlock Your Hidden Potential: The key to unlock your success . In this book, you can read more more about this Secret Code and other Secret Codes and how can apply the Three Gates framework in your life. Click here to get your copy. Give it as a gift to someone who is aspiring to get to the next level in their life and career.

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